Senior AFL writer for The Age

Matt Hall's memories of his time playing football are fond, but he wonders whether his struggle with his own sexuality helped shape his playing persona. Photo: Ken Irwin

Matt Hall's personal journey reads like a timeline synonymous with the sporting world and Australian football's gradual acceptance of homosexuality.

In 1998, against a backdrop of fear and suspicion, he made headlines after being refused registration in the Victorian Amateur Football Association because of his HIV-positive status, a ruling he fought and beat in the courts.

By 2002, with his playing days over, he finally felt comfortable enough to "come out", still having to convince former teammates with whom he'd played for 15 years that there had been nothing untoward going on when he had showered with them.

Two years ago, after former St Kilda player Stephen Milne had been fined for directing a homophobic comment towards Collingwood opponent Heritier Lumumba, and after local league player Jason Ball had opened up publicly about being gay in football's macho world, Hall decided he wanted to be actively involved in continuing the shift in attitudes.

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He's since attended various presentations by Ball as part of the AFL's discrimination and vilification education program. On Friday night at Etihad Stadium before the Essendon-Sydney clash, he was part of an outside broadcast by gay and lesbian community radio station Joy 94.9, featuring a pre-recorded statement from Collingwood premiership player Luke Ball.

And on Saturday, as countries around the globe mark International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHOT), he's a key player in the gay community's continuing attempt to raise awareness about issues surrounding homosexuality in the football community.

It's a big day for the gay community, and Hall is proud to be playing a leading part in it. "Days like IDAHOT are fantastic for promoting support for an understanding of people who identify as GLBTI (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual and intersexual)," he says.

"They not only have a higher risk of mental health issues, a higher percentage of them don't play team sports, which I've found interesting, because playing football all my life, I didn't even think about that.

"Jason and I have found the vast majority of our friends didn't play team sports. They maybe tried them, but they were discriminated against. They may have been a bit effeminate or not as good as the others, and were put down, harassed or bullied, by coaches, other parents. That's going back a few years. I think society is getting better, so that if that occurred now, a majority would pull it up."

Hall's memories of his time playing football are fond, but he wonders whether his struggle with his own sexuality helped shape his playing persona.

"I was pretty average skill-wise," he chuckles. "It was always important to me to have the respect of my teammates, and part of me deep down always felt that I had to be a bit tougher maybe than some of the others."

Now 42, he chose to come out in 2002 only at the age of 30. "I was in denial," he says. "I grew up in Reservoir, which was a tough area. As a teenager, I wasn't attracted to guys. If I thought I was, I'd just hit it on the head immediately, because I was never going to be that person, I wasn't going to be gay. I was a footy player, into car racing and motorbikes, and that was just the way it was."

He's not sure why the AFL is still to see its first openly gay player, when the supposedly less progressive NRL has for nearly two decades had a strong gay role model in former international representative Ian Roberts.

"After I came out, a couple of older guys were a bit uncomfortable with it because they'd showered with me for 15 years, and I had to sit down with them and their wives, and it was basically as blunt as: 'At any time in that 15 years did Matt ever get sexually aroused, or did they ever feel that he was behaving in an inappropriate manner?'

"And the answer, of course, was 100 per cent 'no'. When you play football, they're your mates, your buddies. It's like your family, you don't look on them as a potential sexual conquest."

But they're the sort of questions Hall and Jason Ball have become used to fielding in their workshops presented to footballers, their coaches and managers.

"Jason did a workshop the AFL organised called 'training the trainers', and the questions were really interesting. The first guy to put up his hand was from the country somewhere, and he said: 'Mate, I've never met a gay person. If one of my players comes to me and says 'I'm gay', what do I do?'

"And that's what it's all about. Getting the right resources and support. There's no right answer. I guess it's just about acceptance and education and support, because everyone's journey is going to be different."

In that context, Hall isn't as scathing as some towards the likes of Sam Newman, who reignited the debate about homophobia with some comments on Wednesday night's Footy Show about openly gay American footballer Michael Sam kissing his boyfriend on camera upon being drafted by the St Louis Rams.

"Comments from Sam and [previous offender] Jason Akermanis don't help," he says. "But I think every one of us at some stage has been biased, not deliberately to hurt someone, just because of their upbringing, or personal beliefs.

"That's something even I had to learn. I used to say things I didn't even realise were derogatory. But having that negative connotation of the word 'gay', as soon as you say that in a negative context, it actually filters through. That can have a serious impact on a lot of people's health, and that's not fair."

But Hall is enthusiastic about the AFL's efforts to help change attitudes. "They're ahead of the government on it, that's for sure," he says.

The AFL sponsored the recent "Pride Cup" between Yarra Glen and Yarra Junction, and is open to a "gay pride" AFL game if clubs are interested. The AFL Players' Association was also represented at the recent gay pride march. "The feedback I'm getting on the AFL has been fantastic. There's more compassion and understanding than there's been in the past. It's just a natural progression."

And for Hall and his fellow advocates for gay rights, a radio broadcast outside the ground hosting one of this weekend's biggest AFL games, and on the eve of IDAHOT, is another small, but significant step in that progress.